Month: March 2015
ancient Greek epitaphs: Herais & Sozomene for their husbands
Given the prevalence of anti-men gender bigotry, some may wonder: do women truly love men?
Ancient Greek epitaphs show the long history of women’s love for men. Here’s an epitaph from the second or third century:
I Herais lie here, stranger, five times seven {years old}
And I urge you, my husband,
Not to keep weeping. For the thread of the Moirai calls everyone. [1]
The epitaph begins with a conventional first-person address to the conventionally anonymous passerby (“stranger”). The first verse provides information that remains conventional on gravestones to this day: the name of the deceased (Herais) and her age at death (five times seven = thirty-five). The epitaph’s second verse, however, suggests that Herais selected/dictated her epitaph just before her death.[2] Herais personally addresses her weeping husband. She urges him to move beyond his grief at her death.
Personal words from women are relatively rare in the ancient historical record. The long-established, long-misinterpreted literature of men’s sexed protests describes suffering and injustices that men have endured from women and within marriage. But not all men were like that. Some men wept when their wives died. Moreover, some women did not relish their husbands’ weeping. Herais didn’t want her husband to be weeping. After expressing that concern, so poignant to readers today, Herais returns to conventional expression in ancient Greek epitaphs. Ancient Greeks commonly attributed the course of persons’ lives to fate (the Moirai). The distinctive, personal words in Herais’s epitaph are her words of comfort for her grieving, weeping husband.
Another ancient Greek epitaph provides women’s words with more subtle poetry. In the second or third century, Sozomene had inscribed for her husband Crispinus this epitaph:
Here is the tomb of swift-fated, mindful Crispinus
For whom no stock of children will later appear.
A destructive Ker overcame them both before him.
So his wedded wife Sozomene inscribed his gravestone
For mortals still to be born to learn from. [3]
The term “swift-fated” suggests that Crispinus died young. He lived long enough, however, to have two children. Those children predeceased him. With bracketing of the first verse, the subsequent verses are a chiasma of thematic contrasts. A destructive Ker (death-spirit) killed their children. Sozomene in response inscribed stone. For Crispinus “no stock of children will later appear.” But Sozomene’s inscription offers teaching “for mortals still to be born to learn from.” A teacher gives birth to knowledge in students. His students are like children to him. The first verse describes Crispinus as “mindful” with a Greek word associated with the philosophical ideal of prudence. With her epitaph, Sozomene lovingly provides for Crispinus to have more children in the life of the mind.
Women have long loved men and cared for men’s welfare. Men are more responsible for anti-men gender bigotry than are women. Men seeking compassionate help would best look to women.
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Read more:
- Julianus gravestone suggests ancient, mass-produced Christian gravestones
- gods and physicians in ancient Greek inscriptions and epigrams
- visual poetry: a Hellenistic “coronis” epigram
Notes:
[1] Epitaph (gravestone inscription) from Amorgus, among the southeastern Greek islands. From Greek trans. Hansen (1998) p. 336, from Greek text in Peek (1955) p. 93, no. 372. Some epitaphs were composed as literary pieces and never actually engraved on gravestones.
[2] Widespread conventions in gravestone epitaphs suggests that engravers offered customers choices among standard verses. A common verse: “It is not dying that is grievous, since it is destined for all, … {continued in various ways, e.g. but that I died before the journal completed the review of my article, etc.} Id. pp. 329-332.
[3] Epitaph (gravestone inscription) from Berrhoea. Βέρροια, now commonly transliterated as Veria, is in northern Greece. From Greek trans. Hansen (1998) p. 335, from Greek text in Peek (1955) p. 33, no. 107. The Greek word translated as “mindful” is πινυτου (pinytou).
[image] Southern Barbarians in Japan. Painting, ink, color, and gold on paper. Edo period (1515-1868), Japan. Accession number F1965.22-23. Thanks to Freer Gallery of Art and Arthur M. Sackler Gallery.
References:
Hansen, William F., ed. 1998. Anthology of ancient Greek popular literature. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.
Peek, Werner. 1955. Griechische Vers-Inschriften. Band I, Grab-Epigramme. Berlin: Akademie-Verlag.
women and men on medieval women writers
A free, online book, Medieval Women Writers’ Loving Concern for Men, is now available worldwide. This book shows the public importance of medieval women writers’ outstanding work. For teachers of medieval literature, this book can usefully serve as a supplement to Peter Dronke’s erudite and influential book, Women Writers of the Middle Ages.
While Dronke’s book was published in 1984, women writers of the Middle Ages still have not been adequately appreciated. Dronke in the preface described his book as:
an affirmation of the intrinsic value of writings that have been — I believe quite unjustly — undervalued in the past. It is not necessary here to dwell on the history and causes of this, or on the diverse attempts to belittle the rare women whose writings did achieve fame. [1]
The term “rare” applied to women has roots in the Latin phrase rara avis (“rare bird”) in Juvenal’s widely and unjustly disparaged Satire 6.[2] Belittling women implies not taking women seriously and not recognizing their power and importance. Juvenal’s Satire 6, in contrast, fully recognizes the enormity of women’s importance. While Dronke doesn’t dwell on belittling rare women, he provides sufficient examples:
It will suffice to recall, by way of illustration, that in 1867 Hrotsvitha’s works were alleged to be a hoax perpetrated by the humanist Conrad Celtes, who first edited the principal manuscript, and that this ‘discovery’ gave rise to some coarsely mocking verses; or that till quite recent times, notwithstanding Hildegard of Bingen’s meticulous account of her method of composition, scholars exaggerated the role of her men secretaries to the point of implying that they were the real begetters of her works; again, speculations about male authorship of some of Heloise’s letters are still with us, and are still treated much more seriously — there’s the rub — than for instance the suggestion that Bacon, or Marlowe, wrote the works of Shakespeare. [3]
Today, men die from violence four times more frequently that women do. Men are incarcerated for doing nothing more than having consensual sex and being too poor to pay for state-forced financial fatherhood. If humanistic scholars don’t care about those facts, they might consider: the share of men who have read a work of literature in the past year is only 68% of that for women. Men receive only 56% of the total number of advanced degrees in study of literature and the humanities that women receive.[4] Adequately appreciating medieval women writers depends on adequately appreciating these realities.
Scholars have not adequately recognized the importance of medieval women writers for men. Of the eight English-language scholarly reviews of Women Writers of the Middle Ages, six were written by women. One reviewer, who is now recognized as one of the most eminent medieval historians, wrote:
Dronke still speaks of women writers too much in the context of their relationship to men. … his choice of which passages and texts to emphasize still focuses more than the nature of women’s writing itself warrants on the ways in which women perceive men and their relationship to men. [5]
As Medieval Women Writers’ Loving Concern for Men makes clear, Dronke wrote relatively little on medieval women writers’ relationships with men. The way that medieval women writers perceived men and showed concern for men is an outstanding feature of their work. Much scholarship doesn’t recognize that medieval women writers didn’t write just for women. Medieval women writers wrote for men in ways that should not remain beyond understanding today.
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Read more:
- Medieval Women Writers’ Loving Concern for Men
- Suero de Quinones shows the social disaster of chivalry
- Saint Jerome’s letters show his profound concern for women
Notes:
[1] Dronke (1984) p. ix.
[2] Juvenal, Satire 6.165: rara avis in terris nigroque simillima cycno (“a rare bird on earth and most similar to a black swan”).
[3] Dronke (1984) p. ix, omitted footnote scornfully cites Georges Dubay questioning attribution of work to Marie de France (such as this) and Heloise (such as this). Dubay, like others, evidently lacked appreciation for medieval women writers’ concern for men. Questioning attribution of work to women writers now tends to generate intense hostility. Consider, for example, the question of whether Mary Shelley actually authored Frankenstein. See Lauritsen (2007) Preface, Ch. 5 & Ch. 7. Here’s some online discussion of the handwriting-authorship fallacy with respect to Frankenstein and prefaces to the 1818 and 1831 versions of Frankenstein. Stevenson’s massive tome on women Latin poets states, “Mary Shelley read Latin and Greek as well as French and Italian.” Stevenson (2005) p. 425. That statement doesn’t fairly represent Mary Shelley’s classical learning.
[4] U.S. masters and Ph.D. degrees conferred, 2010-11, compiled from U.S. Department of Education, Digest of Educational Statistics, 2012. The compiled data and calculations are available in the humanities gender protrusion spreadsheet (alternate Excel version).
[5] Bynum (1985) p. 328. Bynum is now Professor emerita of Medieval European History at the School of Historical Studies at the Institute of Advanced Study in Princeton, New Jersey. The single man reviewer was Ralph Hexter. He is now Provost and Executive Vice Chancellor of the University of California, Davis. For the names of all seven reviewers, with institutional affiliations at the time of review and journal in which the review appeared, see the Dronke reviewers spreadsheet (alternate Excel version).
[image] Soft Bathtub (Model) — Ghost Version. Claes Oldenburg, 1966. Canvas, wood, acrylic paint, and mixed media. Item 1998 (98.18), Hirshhorn Museum, Washington, DC. Douglas Galbi’s photograph at Hirschhorn Museum.
References:
Bynum, Caroline Walker. 1985. Review. “Women Writers of the Middle Ages: A Critical Study of Texts from Perpetua († 203) to Marguerite Porete († 1310).” Modern Language Quarterly. 46 (3): 326-329.
Dronke, Peter. 1984. Women writers of the Middle Ages: a critical study of texts from Perpetua († 203) to Marguerite Porete († 1310). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Lauritsen, John. 2007. The man who wrote Frankenstein. Dorchester, MA: Pagan Press.
Stevenson, Jane. 2005. Women Latin poets: language, gender, and authority, from antiquity to the eighteenth century. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Dafydd ap Gwilym's penis under law in medieval Welsh poetry
The fourteenth-century Welsh poet Dafydd ap Gwilym addressed his penis in poetry. If even noticed, the criminalization of men’s sexuality tends to be seen as a bizarre aberration of twenty-first-century elite culture. Yet that tendency in law can also be perceived in this penis poem from fourteenth-century Wales. Dafydd ap Gwilym began his penis poem with forthright recognition of the force of law on his penis:
By God, cock, there’s need to keep you
Under guard with eye and hand,
Stiff-headed pole, with this law-suit,
Even better from now on.
Cunt’s net-float, because of complaint,
Needs must your snout be snaffled
To keep you from being indicted
Again. [1]
Old French fabliaux disparage and devalue men’s genitals. The thirteenth-century account of the nun of Watton shows relatively little concern about viciously castrating a man for nothing more than having consensual sex. Embracing social disparagement and legal suppression of men’s genitals, Dafydd ap Gwilym subtly created a counter-melody proclaiming the value of his penis:
You’re a loathsome rolling-pin,
Scrotum’s horn: don’t rise, don’t waggle,
Noble ladies’ New-Year’s-gift
…
You’re longer than a large man’s thigh,
Long night’s roving, hundred nights’ chisel,
Auger like the signpost’s pillar,
Leatherhead that’s called a shaft.
You’re a sceptre that causes lust,
A girl’s bare arse’s lid-bolt.
The phrase “loathsome rolling-pin” explicitly signals contempt and implicitly vicious violence. Horns are associated with the devil and cuckoldry. But horns are also associated with strength and plenty. A sceptre is a kingly sign, while a lid-bolt performs a common function. For noble women, men’s sexuality is a New Year’s gift.
Noble women eagerly waiting for the coming of a New Year must fight against disparagement and criminalization of men’s sexuality. Dafydd ap Gwilym’s poem ends with poignant irony in addressing his penis:
You are a trouser-problem personified,
suede-necked, gander-glide,
congenital liar, pod from which indecency has sprung,
nail on which injunctions are hung.Now you’re once more been brought to book
you should bow your head, you children’s dibbling-hook.
It’s so hard to keep you in check,
you pathetic little pecker-peck.
Your master will stand in the dock because of you,
because you’re rotten through-and-through. [2]
Universities’ star-chamber proceedings on claims of sexual assault stage obtuse, ignorant readings of Dafydd ap Gwilym’s penis poem.
Gwerful Mechain’s medieval Welsh vagina poem shows sharply contrasting public values. She begins by complaining that poets praise all of a woman’s body except “the place where children are conceived.”[3] That’s because most men lack the boldness to affirm the center of their sexual interest. Predating the Vagina Monologues by nearly half a millennium, Gwerful Mechain’s poem lavishly praises the vagina:
You’re a piece with unfailing power,
a faultless court of fat’s plumage,
Here’s my credo: the quiff is lovely,
Circlet of broad-edged lips,
Dingle deeper than hand or ladle,
Trench to hold a two-handed prick,
Cunt there next the full-cheeked rump,
Songbook with red facing pages. [4]
Gwerful Mechain ended her vagina poem by invoking God’s protection for the flawless vagina:
Noble forest, flawless gift,
Soft frieze, fur for fair bollocks,
Girl’s thick grove, precious welcome’s round,
Splendid bush, may God preserve it.
Gwerful Mechain’s vagina poem isn’t famous. It doesn’t need to be. Versions of it run naturally through primates’ minds.
In a poem complaining about jealous wives, Gwerful Mechain declared women’s sexual interest in a “bigger than average cock.” She boasted, “every big-cocked lover is after me.”[5] Then she complained that women with such men value them too highly. According to Mechain, a wife values a “big prick” more than her father, her wealth, her clothes and jewelry, her mother, her brothers, her sister, and all her possessions. Old French fabliaux describe men being valued merely for their penises. Mechain’s poem emphasizes that demeaning of a man’s person. She doesn’t praise even just the penis. She complains that other women value men-penises too highly. In broad historical and evolutionary perspectives, her claim isn’t credible.
Creating public value for the penis equal to that of the vagina is probably beyond the power of poets. But reducing the vastly disproportionate imprisonment of men should be attempted.
* * * * *
Read more:
- Basilius & Gallicanus: Hrotsvit on men’s entitlement to love
- medieval men protesting devaluation of masculine love
- appreciation for men’s sexuality in Hildegard’s Causae et curae
Notes:
[1] Dafydd ap Gwilym, Cywydd y Gal (Penis Poem), from Welsh trans. Clancy (2003) p. 192. The subsequent quote is from id. The Welsh text, an audio of a Welsh reading, an English translation, and additional information are available on the Swansea University’s excellent Dafydd ad Gwilym site (see entry 85 -Y Gal on the choose-poem dropdown box). Dafydd ap Gwilym wrote Cywydd y Gal probably in the period 1330-1350. Johnston (1991) p. 29.
[2] Trans. Muldoon (2009) p. 113. Muldoon’s translation is livelier than Clancy’s. Johnston claims in his preface to the poem that it is “in fact an elaborate means of boasting the poet’s sexual process.” Johnston (1991) p. 29. That perspective lacks appreciation for the legal context of the poem. Johnston’s introduction makes clear that he is a modern-day Suero de Quinones.
Other medieval Welsh poems disparage men’s genitals. Dafydd ab Edmwnd’s Dychan i Geuilliau Guto’r Glyn (Satire on Guto’r Glyn’s Testicles) describes Guto’r Glyn’s testicles as a “repulsive shaft … vile fulling-mill … a paunch of puss” and other descriptions of disease. Guto’r Glyn’s Dychan i Gal Dafydd ab Edmwnd (Satire on Dafydd ab Edmwnd’s Penis) responds by declaring that Dafydd ab Edmwnd has “a linden tree of a diseased prick.” Trans. Johnston (1991) pp. 127, 131.
[3] Gwerful Mechain, Cywydd y Cedor (Vagina Poem), from Welsh trans. Johnston (1991) p. 41. Here’s the full English translation of Cywydd y Cedor, as well as the Welsh text. Clancy (2003) p. 339 has “the place where children are bred.” That translation is less consistent with the wondrous, laudatory tone of Cywydd y Cedor. Cywydd y Gal and Cywydd y Cedor commonly occur together in medieval manuscripts, with both poems attributed to Gwerful Mechain. But there is strong textual and stylistic evidence that Dafydd ap Gwilym authored Cywydd y Gal.
[4] Id. trans. Clancy (2003) p. 339. Id. titles this poem Vivat Vagina and the previous poem, Reproach to his Penis. The actual Welsh titles are symmetric and less descriptive. For clarity, I’ve replaced above the second line in id., “The feathered crutch’s flawless court,” with the corresponding verse translation from Johnston (1991) p. 43.
[5] Gwerful Mechain, I Wragedd Eiddigeddus (To Jealous Wives), from Welsh trans. Johnston (1991) pp. 37, 39. Johnston, underscoring the women-are-wonderful effect, laughably declares that the poem is “a subtle but clear proclamation of female sexuality.”
[image] Tide {detail}. Jan Dibbets, 1969. Gelatin silver prints. Joseph H. Hirshhorn Purchase Fund, 2007. The Panza Collection (07.43). Hirshhorn Museum, Washington, DC. Douglas Galbi’s photograph at Hirschhorn Museum.
References:
Clancy, Joseph P., trans. 2003. Medieval Welsh poems. Dublin: Four Courts Press.
Johnston, Dafydd. 1991. Canu Maswedd yr Oesoedd canol = Medieval Welsh erotic poetry. Grangetown: Tafol.
Muldoon, Paul. 2009. Dafydd ap Gwilym. “Y Gal.” Irish Studies Review. 17(1): 111-113.